When I wanted to write about Christmas this week, I wondered if it was too early.Then I saw two Christmas posts on a couple of my favorite "intentional living" blogs and I felt like I was in good company. So… onwards and upwards.

When you think about Christmas, what are the aspects that overwhelm you and stress you out?

For me, it's not knowing what's happening.

I'm a girl who loves a plan and I like to know who's hosting the lunch and what I have to bring.

I also like to have clear in my mind what we're doing about gifts and cards. Read more

When I wanted to write about Christmas this week, I wondered if it was too early.Then I saw two Christmas posts on a couple of my favorite "intentional living" blogs and I felt like I was in good company. So… onwards and upwards.

When you think about Christmas, what are the aspects that overwhelm you and stress you out?

For me, it's not knowing what's happening.

I'm a girl who loves a plan and I like to know who's hosting the lunch and what I have to bring.

I also like to have clear in my mind what we're doing about gifts and cards. Read more

I get so many emails from people telling me that it all just gets so overwhelming they don't know where to start.One day everything is okay and the next it seems as if the paper is all over the place, they can't find what they need on their computer, they have thousands of emails in their inbox and they're paralyzed with overwhelm.

They can't even get to urgent tasks, let alone the important ones that will help them reach their goals.

This is an excerpt from a newsletter by from Marcia Francois (my list hero!) – Enjoy!

In the process of updating my 36 things list and making a new 37 things list (Marcia's 37th birthday was last week – Happy Birthday!), and talking about these a bit too much with friends and colleagues, I realized a few things: Read more

We all know people that seem to be Super Organised. They never forget birthdays, can find an email within seconds and know exactly where to find anything in their homes.The actual definition of organized is being able to find anything within a minute or two. These are items in your home to an email, document or photo on your computer.

Shhhh – I have a confession. Some people say this about me too, so I'm going to let you in on some of my own secrets and also those I've observed from watching fellow Born Organized people. Read more

Today I want to talk about an area of the office that may just be one of my favourite things to organise – your computer!

Because we can't see computer clutter as obviously as we can see physical clutter, we often don't realise it's there but believe me, it's still affecting you.

How does it affect you?

When you open your Inbox and feel drained at the sight of all your emails, when your computer runs slow because there are so many photos on there and when you click into your Google Reader and can't BELIEVE how much some people post because you went through your blogs for 3 hours yesterday and now there are 127 unread items yet again! Read more

I have two gmail accounts – don't ask, it's a long story – and what I've been doing is using the one as my main Google Reader account and the other for some blogs I wanted to keep track of, but they don't post regularly so those posts can pile up.

I've been subscribing like crazy to both my Google Reader accounts so they're getting out of hand and it's not uncommon for me to find 81 items unread, which is unusual for me. Read more

I posted this picture of a minimalist desk on my blog recently and people weighed in with their comments – most said it lacked personality but some said they liked it and actually wanted theirs to look the same.

I've always said that if you make something too complicated, it just won't work, no matter how well-intentioned you are. That's why it's so important to make your systems easy, especially if you live with other people and you want them to live by your organising "rules".
That's true for designing a good flow for laundry in the home and also for recycling paper in the office. Read more

Did you know that there are just over two months left before the end of the year?

Last year, a friend and I participated in an online goals challenge at exactly this time of year. We set some goals and my "big thing" that resulted from the challenge was 7 easy steps to organise your office, which is now a bestselling product in my store. Read more

* Do you find yourself wasting time looking for files on your computer?
* Do you get frustrated because you just don't know where to start?
* Do you know when and how often to do a back up?
* Has your computer ever crashed and you lost everything?
* Do you know how to organise and contain all those free things you keep downloading off the internet?
* Do you know how to name and store files so they're easy to find?

Well, what good is organizing your office and desk while your computer is spilling over with clutter?

Here are four helpful tips to move you towards electronic bliss!

1. Make time daily to delete emails. I've told you before that my goal is to delete 100 emails daily so I go through my inbox, sent items, folders, etc. every couple of days.

2. When you download photos from your digital camera, choose the best ones there and then and delete the rest. I don't know about you but I usually take about 3 or 4 pictures if I can (if the subject is not moving) so that I can choose the absolute best pictures. Read more

I recently had the pleasure of being interviewed by a marketing specialist in Canada.

While we were chatting on the phone, she volunteered to be a guinea pig as I taught her some office organising principles. It worked really well because she and I were both at our desks while we talked on the phone.

With letters, cards and notes, I restrict myself to a memory box which is the size of a big shoebox (the ones that boots come in).

When that box gets too full, I make myself go through it to throw out things that are no longer as meaningful for me. It's amazing to me how something that you absolutely had to keep at the time can lost its sentimental value after a few years. Read more

One of the most important parts of organising is tweaking your systems.

It's perfectly normal to organise a space and find that it's not quite working the way you envisioned.

That doesn't mean you throw out the whole thing! Please don't do that.

All you need to do is a little tweak here and there.

Like this:
The other night I was doing my whole face routine and realised that I was slightly irritated by a tiny cabinet above my basin. Remember, I have the dubious honour of having the smallest bathroom in the world. My Private Platinum Clients actually love seeing it – I should charge admission. Read more

Baskets make really good organising tools for containing items. When you're organising, you always want to keep like items together and this is a great way to do just that.

It's much easier to pull a basket off a shelf, remove something and then put it back instead of feeling your way on the shelf, messing up everything. When the basket has a handle, it's also very easy to carry from room to room (like in the case of cleaning supplies).

They're cheap and you can easily re-purpose if you outgrow the basket or it no longer suits the original purpose. Read more

"My husband has his own business and I'm the bookkeeper of said business. All this paper really does have a purpose, and to clean it up means I have to touch it all!! I cannot get motivated to do that."

Here are a few quick ideas I thought of:

Throw away any paper that does obviously not belong in the space (takeaway menus come to mind). The better you do this part, the easier the rest of the process will be.

Decide what does belong there. Some things will be "keepers" but just don't need to be in that space and can be moved to storage. Read more

As some of you know, I work a full-time job, run the business after work and on weekends, and I do ministry work at my church. With all these things going on, I have to be quite portable because there's nothing worse than not having something you need. Or having it, but in the wrong location!

So I have an "office in a bag".

1. I use one of these book bags for my business & personal stuff to and fro work.

2. The pictures below show the one I use for the ministry work. Read more